Nicknames Are A Fun Way to Relive the Times of Your Life
A part of your legacy, there’s a story behind each one
In the beginning, everyone called me Susie, because who calls an infant Susan? It fit and stuck, throughout my childhood.
It suited my campy, playful nature, and it sounded sweetly soothing, when pronounced with a slight question at the end, like when my grandma asked, “Susie? You sure you don’t want anything to eat, sweetie?”
For a minute, during an awkward stage before the size of my face caught up to my two front teeth, a few kids called me Bucky.
My third-grade teacher, Miss Miller, called me Suzie-Q, after her calico cat. I had a calico cat too, so it was just too cute and coinky-dink for her to resist. Other kids called me ‘teacher’s pet’ which was true. I was the only one with the same name as the real pet of our teacher.
Then it was Giraffe, thanks to a painful 4th-grade growth spurt that caused my legs to ache like they were being prodded with red-hot pokers and left me head and shoulders above most of my classmates.
In 5th and 6th grade, wanna-be cowboys taunted me with every variation on my last name, Wyatt. Earpy, Earp, and full-on Wyatt Earp, which seemed lazy and was technically incorrect. My first name was Susie, not…
